A 2017 study of twins between the ages of 11 and 16 found that being bullied around age 11 caused anxiety, depression, hyperactivity and impulsivity, inattention, and conduct problems, some of which lasted for years. Participants recorded their experiences with physical or verbal bullying, social manipulation, and property attacks (trying to break one’s belongings, for example).

The effects of bullying decreased over time. The bullied children were still significantly more anxious than their non-bullied twins two years later, but this difference faded by the five-year mark. However, paranoid thoughts and cognitive disorganization did persist for 5 years.
The twin study design helped researchers zone in on the causal effect bullying might have on the children’s mental health, rather than other factors the twins shared, such as genetics or family environment. The study included 11,108 twins born in England and Wales.

The research by Timothy Singham and colleagues was published in the journal JAMA Psychiatry. Interestingly, the researchers found that prior mental health difficulties increased children’s likelihood of being bullied, such that being bullied could be considered a symptom of preexisting vulnerabilities. Singham and colleagues suggest that in addition to interventions to reduce bullying and address familial factors that might make children susceptible to bullying, children should also be taught resilience skills.

Transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is a therapy in which electrodes placed on the skull deliver a steady, low level current to the brain, changing its threshold for electrical activity. Anodal tDCS to the prefrontal cortex can improve working memory. In a small 2017 study in the Journal of Neural Transmission, Cornelia Soff and colleagues found for the first time that tDCS may improve symptoms of attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

People with ADHD tend to have underactivation of the prefrontal cortex and deficits in working memory. The study randomized 15 young people aged 12–16 (three girls and twelve boys) to receive either real tDCS or a sham stimulation. The anodal tDCS was delivered at 1 mA targeting the left dorsolateral prefrontal cortex for 5 days. Those participants who received tDCS showed a reduction in inattention, impulsivity, and hyperactivity compared to those who received the sham stimulation. The effects were more pronounced 7 days after the stimulation, suggesting that tDCS’ effects may be long-term. Larger, more definitive trials are needed to clarify the effects of tDCS on ADHD, but these preliminary findings are promising.

At the 2015 meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, researcher Jeffrey R. Strawn reported that among children at high risk for bipolar disorder (because of a family history of the disorder) who are prescribed antidepressants for depression and anxiety, adverse reactions are common. These reactions include irritability, aggression, impulsivity, and hyperactivity, and often lead to discontinuation of the antidepressant treatment.

Younger patients at risk for bipolar disorder were more likely to have an adverse reaction to antidepressants. Risk of an adverse reaction decreased 27% with each year of age.

An article published by Braun et al. in Pediatrics last year suggests that children who were exposed to higher levels of BPA while in the womb exhibited more anxious and depressed behaviors and poorer emotional control and inhibition at age 3. Braun described the implications of this finding to Medscape Medical News:

“At this point, we don’t know what these findings mean in terms of clinical disorders of behavior,” Joe M. Braun, MSPH, PhD, from the Department of Environmental Health, Harvard School of Public Health, Boston, Massachusetts, told Medscape Medical News. “Future studies will need to determine if BPA exposures are associated with clinical behavior disorders,” he said.

BPA is used in a variety of consumer products, including dental sealants, food/beverage containers and linings, medical equipment, and thermal receipts, such as those from ATM machines. Virtually all people in industrialized nations are exposed to the plasticizer.

“People who are concerned about BPA exposure could decrease or eliminate their consumption of canned or packaged foods; they could also avoid contact with thermal receipts,” Dr. Braun said.

At the 57th Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) in October 2010, Gianni Faedda of the Lucio Bini Mood Disorders Center reported that monitoring of activity, sleep, and circadian-rhythm disturbances can be used to distinguish children with a diagnosis of bipolar illness (who showed more hyperactivity and less sleep), from children with ADHD and control children without illness.

Although the editors of BipolarNews.org have made every effort to report accurate information, much of the work referenced here is in abstract or pre-publication form, and may not have received proper review by the scientific community at this time. Patients should consult with their physicians about any treatment decisions. Physicians should consult the peer-reviewed literature.